Compensating hinge structure for automobile hoods or the like



Jan- 2, 19 A. CLAUD-MANTLE C OMPENSATING HINGE STRUCTURE FOR AUTOMOBILE HOODS OR THE LIKE Filed Jan. 17, 1938 INVENTOR ARTHUR EILBUEMANTLE.

ATTORNEY Patented Jan. 2, 1940 UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE COMPENSATING HINGE STRUCTURE FOR AUTOMOBILE HOODS OR THE LIKE Arthur Gland-Mantle, Trumbull, Conn., asslgnor to The Bassick Company, Bridgeport, Conn., a corporation 01' Connecticut Application January 17, 1938, Serial No. 185,457

4 Claims. (Cl. 16-146) The present invention relates to a compensat- Fig. 4 is a side elevation, similar to Fig. 1, and ing hinge structure for automobile hoods or the showing the hood in an intermediate position like, and particularly hoods of the so-called alliduring the raising operation. gator type which are hinged at their rearward Fig. 5 shows the hood fully raised and sup- 5 ends and are held in closed position by the hood ported by the hinge means. 5

catch at the forward end. In hoods of this type Similar reference characters indicate correthe edges of the cowl and the hood are usually sponding parts throughout the several figures oi curved forwardly from the vertical side edges the drawing.

toward the center of the top, and in swinging Referring to the drawing, the hinge structure the hood into openposition it is important that according to the invention is adapted to be emthe rearward edge of the hood have a movement ployed in connection with an alligator type hood forwardly and upwardly with respect to the forfor enclosing an engine compartment having ward edge of the cowl so that it will clear the .flxed sides In, provided at each of their upper cowl during the opening movement and there edges with an inwardly bent ledge flange ll diswill be no chance of marring the finish. To this posed horizontally and upon which the respecend it is an object of the invention to provide tive lower edge of the hood at each side is adaptmeans which will cause the rearward edge of ed to seat in closed position, and a cowl l2, the the hood to describe a predetermined and differupper portion of which extends over the rearential path. ward portion of the engine compartment and A further object of the invention is to prohas its forward edge I3 curved forwardly toward an vide compensating hinge means which will effecthe center line of the hood. The hood i4 is protually retain the hood in closed position under vided at each of its lower edges with an inwardly spring pressure, maintaining the hood tightly in bent flange iii to which a resilient sealing strip relation to the side closure structure of the en- I6 is secured, and which strips are adapted to gine compartment against looseness and vibraseat upon the ledges ll of the sides Ill, the rear- 25 tion, and which will permit the hood to be ward edge I! of the hood being shaped to conraised with facility. In particular it is proposed form to the edge'l3 of the cowl, so that in the to provide hinge means which will offer only very closed position the hood is substantially conslight resistance after the initial opening movetinuous with the cowl surface. Within the rearment is imparted to the hood, and in which ward part of the engine compartment an inner 130 spring means employed to normally retain the v cowl structure I8 is provided, the side walls of hood closed will assist in moving the hood to which are inwardly spaced from the sides l0 and open position after the opening movement has the upper wall of which is downwardly spaced been manually started. It is also proposed to from the upper portion of the cowl l2 and the provide detent locking means which will suphood. 3 35 port the hood in open position so that there will The hinge structures, according to the invenbe no chance of it accidentally closing, but which tion are mounted upon the side walls of the inner may be released with relatively little manual cowl structure I8 and are connected to the hood efiort. at each side, these hinge structures at each side With the above and other objects in view, an being of identical construction but in reverse 4o embodiment of the invention is shown in the relation to each other. For the sake of clearaccompanying drawing, and this embodiment ness of illustration and description, therefore, will be hereinafter more fully described with only the hinge structure at one side is shown.

reference thereto, and the invention will be A bracket consisting of an inwardly offset porfinally pointed out in the claims. tion I 9 and upwardly and downwardly extend- 45 In the drawing: ing outwardly offset portions 20 and 2| is rigidly Fig. 1 is a side elevationof a portion of the secured to the wall ill by means of bolts 22 en- 'engine compartment and cow], and the reargaged through slots 23 in the portion 19, these ward portion of the hood, the latter beingparslots being horizontally disposed so as to permit tially broken away to show the hinge means at a slight longitudinal adjustment of the bracket. 50 one side of the hood. The upwardly extending portion 20 of the bracket Fig. 2 is a vertical sectional view taken along is provided with a forwardly disposed upwardly the line 2-2 of Fig. l. projecting pivot supporting portion 24, at each Fig. 3 is a vertical sectional view taken along side of which a linlr member 25 is pivotally sethe line 3--3 of Fig. 1. cured by a rivet pin 26, and with a rearwardly 55 projecting pivot supporting portion 21, at each side of which a link member 28 is pivotally secured by means of a pivot pin 29. The link members are pivotally connected to the forward end of a bracket 30 secured to the hood by means of a flange 3i bent from the upper portion of the bracket, which may be welded or otherwise attached to the under surface of the hood, the connection between the link members 25 and the bracket being provided by means of a rivet pin 32 in the bracket engaged in slots 33 in the link members 25, these slots being horizontally disposed in the closed position, asshown in Fig. 1. The link members 28 are pivotally connected to the rearward end of the bracket 30 by a rivet pin 34.

It will be noted that the pivot axes provided by the rivet pins 32 and 34 are disposed in a horizontal plane in the closed position of the hood, that the axis of the pivot pin 25 is in a plane above the plane of the pivot axis of the pin 29, and that the lengths of the link members 25 is greater than that of the link members 28. These points are predetermined to cause the rear edge of the hood as it is raised to move forwardly away from the edge I3 as the hood is raised, the lower ends of the edge il moving forwardly and upwardly in a relatively low angle outside arc and the central upper portion of the edge l'l moving first forwardly and upwardly and then slightly rearwardly in a relatively high angle inside arc.

Centrally oi the link members 2828 and at each of their outer sides there are pivotally connected by means of a rivet pin 35, the upper ends of a pair of detent levers 36-46 the lower ends of these levers being connected by a rivet pin 31 upon which there is provided between the levers a spacing washer 38, and over which there is engaged the upper hooked end of a helical spring 39, the lower hooked end of which is connected to the notched projecting finger portion 48 of the lower portion 2| of the bracket. A spacing washer 42 is provided upon the pivot pin between the link members 28-28, and in the closed position of the hood is disposed above a projecting abutment portion 43 provided upon the rearward end of the upper portion 20 of the bracket, and which acts as a limit stop, after a predetermined compression of the sealing strip Hi, this strip however normally preventing engagement of the washer 42 with the abutment portion 43. The detent levers 36 are outwardly bowed adjacent their upper ends, as at 44, so as to provide a clearance space for the head ends of the rivet pin 29 in the open position of the hood shown in Figs. 4 and 5.

The detent levers 36 are each provided with a forwardly projecting detent finger 45 having its forward end extending upwardly at a slight incline and which is adapted to cooperate with the link members 25 in the open position of the hood, the link members 25 each being provided for this purpose with a cam surface 48 which rises gradually with respect to the axis of the pivot pin 26 and terminates in a concentric portion 41, at the end of which there is provided a detent locking projection 48 for locking cooperation with the detent lever finger 45, as will hereinafter more fully appear.

It will be noted that the link members 2525 and the detent levers 3638 are disposed at each side of the bracket portion 28 and in order to maintain them in parallel sliding relation therewith there is provided at each side of the bracket portion 20 a retaining plate 48 spaced outwardly from the portion 28 by spacer blocks 50, the plates and the spacer blocks being secured to the bracket portion 24 by means of rivets 5|. 5

The operation is as follows:

In the closed position of the hood the spring 38 exerts a straight line pull upon the detent levers 38-which in turn draw the link members 28 downwardly about the pivot 28, this pull beingt-suflicient to hold the hood securely at its rearward end, the forward end being held downwardly by means of the usual hood catch provided upon the forward end of the hood. Any slight irregularity in the seating relation between the sides l9 and the hood is compensated for by the slots 33 which permits of a slight movement of the hood about the pivot pin 34. In order to open the hood the forward end is swung upwardly causing the link members 25 and 28 to swing forwardly in clockwise direction.

As the hood approaches the open position the forward ends of the detent fingers 45 engage the cam surfaces 48 swinging .the detent levers 38 in clockwise direction about the pivot pin 35 holding the levers as they move along the concentric cam portions 41 so that during the continued swinging of the link members 25 and 28 there is no appreciable spring resistance to the opening movement of the hood.

As the hood reaches the fully open position the locking projections 48 of the link members 25 snap past the ends of the detent fingers 45 releasing the detent levers 36 so that they are swung forwardly into detent locking position beneath the link members 25, and in which position they are held by the relatively strong pull of the spring 39, which pull is now a straight line pull along the detent levers 36, this straight line pull being forward of the center of the pivot pin 29, so that the link members 28 tend to rotate in clockwise direction thereby maintaining the hood in open position, the rearward end of the bracket 30 being pulled downwardly by the link members 28 and the link members 25 supporting the forward end of the bracket as fulcrums,

these link members being in turn supported by the locking detent provided by the detent levers 36.

It will be noted that during the opening movement the pivot pins 32 engage with the outer ends of the slots 33 as shown in Fig. 4 but when released will seat upon the inner ends as shown in Fig. 5.

In order to close the hood a downward force is exerted upon the forward open end, this force being sufficient to overcome the pull of the spring 39, so that the link members 25 and 28 move in counter-clockwise direction. This first releases the detent lock provided by the detent fingers 45, and as soon as the pull of the spring is past the dead center of the pivot pin 29 the spring exerts its force to swing the links 25 and 28 in counterclockwise direction to bring the hood to closed position.

I have illustrated and described a preferred and satisfactory embodiment of the invention, but it will be understood that changes may be made therein, within the spirit and scope thereof as defined in the appended claims.

Having thus described my invention what I claim and desire to secure by Letters Patent is:

1. A hinge structure for an automobile hood or the like, comprising a supporting bracket adapted to be secured to a fixed part, a swinging bracket adapted to be secured to the hood near its rearward edge, a pair of link members longitudinally spaced with respect to the hood pivotally connected to said supporting bracket at longitudinally spaced points and pivotally connected to said hood bracket at longitudinally spaced points, the rearward link member being shorter than the forward link member whereby difierential swinging movement is imparted to the forward and 'rear ends of said swinging bracket, a detent lever pivotally connected to said rearward link member at a point spaced from its pivotal connection with said supporting bracket, spring means connected to said detent lever normally retaining said link member in hood closing position through force exerted in a line at one side of said pivotal connection and adapted in the open position of'the hood to exert a force at the other side of said pivotal connection to maintain the hood in open position, a detent catch part carried by said detent lever, and a detent catch part carried by said forward link member adapted to be engaged by said detent catch part of said detent lever in said open position under the force of said spring means.

2. A hinge structure for an automobile hood or the like, comprising a supporting bracket adapted to be secured to a fixed part, a swinging bracket adapted to be secured to the hood near its rearward edge, a pair of link members longitudinally spaced with respect to the hood pivotally connected to said supporting bracket at longitudinally spaced points and pivotally connected to said hood bracket at longitudinally spaced points, the rearward link member being shorter than the forward link member whereby differential swinging movement is imparted to the forward and rear ends of said swinging bracket, a detent lever pivotally connected to said rearward link member at a point spaced from its pivotal connection with said supporting bracket, spring means connected to said detent lever normally retaining said link member in hood closing position through force exerted in a line at one side of said pivotal connection and adapted in the open position of the hood to exert a force at the other side of said pivotal connection to maintain the hood in open position, a detent projection carried by said detent lever in spaced relation to its pivoted connection, disposed substantially at an angle to the normal force line of said spring, and a detent catch part carried by said forward link member adapted to be engaged by said detent projection in said open position under the force of said spring 3. A hinge structure for an automobile hood or the like, comprising a supporting bracket adapted to be secured to a fixed part, a swinging bracket adapted to be secured to the hood near its rearward edge, a pairof link members longitudinally spaced with respect to the hood pivotally connected to said supporting bracket at longitudinally spaced points and pivotally connected to said hood bracket at longitudinally spaced points, the rearward link member being shorter than the forward link member whereby differential swinging movement is imparted to the forward and rear ends of said swinging bracket, a detent lever pivotally connected to said rearward link member at a point spaced from its'pivotal connection with said supporting bracket, spring means connected to said detent lever normally retaining said link member in hood closing position through force exerted in a line at one side of said pivotal connection and adapted in the open position of the hood to exert a force at the other side of said pivotal connection to maintain the hood in open position, a detent projection carried by said detent lever in spaced relation to its pivotal connection, disposed substantially at an angle to the normal force line of said spring, a cam part carried by said forward link member adapted to engage said detent projection to swing said detent lever in one direction during opening of said hood against the force of said spring means, and a detent catch part at the end of said cam part adapted to be engaged by said detent projection through swinging of said detent lever in the other direction under the force of said spring means.

4. A hinge structure for an automobile hood or the like, comprising a supporting bracket adapted to be secured to a fixed part,a swinging bracket adapted to be secured to the hood near its rearward edge, a pair of link members longitudinally spaced with respect to the hood pivotally connected to said supporting bracket and swinging bracket at longitudinally spaced points, the pivotal connection of the rearward link member with said swinging bracket being a fixed connection and the pivotal connection of the for: ward link member with said swinging bracket being a floating slot and pin connection, whereby said hood has a limited swinging movement about said fixed connection with respect to said floating slot and pin connection. the rearward link member being shorter than the forward link member whereby differential swinging movement is imparted to the forward and rear ends of said swinging bracket, spring means connected to said rearward link member at a point spaced from its pivotal connection with said supporting bracket normally retaining said link member in hood closing position through force exerted in a line at one side of said pivotal connection and adapted in the open position of the hood to exert a force at the other side of said pivot connection to maintain the hood in open position.

ARTHUR CLAUD-MANI'LE. 

